Position in chronology
CUSAS 03, 0380
About this tablet
A small beer-ration receipt from Garšana, a private estate town in southern Iraq, written around 2035 BCE under King Šu-Suen of Ur. Three men — two of them identified as visitors or hired workers from the city of Isin — were issued a total of five liters of ordinary beer, which they drank on the spot; the expense was charged against the account of a man named Ilī-uzranni and countersigned by the estate's chief administrator and its scribe. The tablet is explicitly labeled a 'copy' (gaba-ri), meaning it duplicates an original docket kept elsewhere in the archive. Documents like this are the daily bookkeeping of a large Ur III household, where even a jug of beer for three laborers was entered, dated to the day, and filed.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Beer issued at the standard ration: two liters each for Ennema and Bēlī-azu, both men from Isin, and one liter for Mašum, the servant of Ea — three men, five liters of ordinary beer in all, consumed on site by the work crew. The amount was debited to Ilī-uzranni's account and handled by Iškur-illat, the estate manager, together with the scribe Puzur-Ninkarak. Dated to the month of kisiki-Ninazu, day 23, in the year King Šu-Suen of Ur set up the great stele for Enlil and Ninlil. This tablet is a duplicate of the original record.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine2 sila of ordinary beer each: Ennema, 1: Bēlī-azu — they are men of Isin. 1 sila: Mašum, servant of Ea. (Total:) 3 (persons). Its ordinary beer: 5 sila. The workmen drank (it). From (the account of) Ilī-uz[ra]nni it was [ex]pended. Via Iškur-illat, the chief household administrator, and Puzur-Ninkarak, the scribe. Month: kisiki-Ninazu. [Year:] Šu-Suen, king of Ur, [erected] the great stele for [Enlil] (and) Ninlil. [Day] 23. Copy.
Our translation engine — Opus 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
2(disz) sila3 kasz du-ta en-ne2-ma 1(disz) be-li2-a-zu lu2-i3-si-in-me 1(disz) sila3 ma-szum ARAD2 e2-A 3(disz) kasz du-bi 5(disz) sila3 gurusz-e-ne ib2-nag ki i3-li2-uz-[ra]-ni-ta [ba]-zi giri3 iszkur-illat szabra u3 puzur4-nin-kar-ke3 dub-sar iti ki-siki nin-a-zu [mu] szu-suen lugal uri5#-ma-ke4 na-ru2-a-mah [en-lil2] nin-lil2 mu-[ne-du3] [u4] 2(u) 3(disz)-kam gaba-ri
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — CUSAS 03, 0380. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šu-Suen y1 — Šu-Suen became king based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: CUNES 49-15-454 (Department of Near Eastern Studies, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA) — from Garšana (mod. uncertain) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P324460). source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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One of the earliest specimens of human writing. Not literature, not law — accounting. The need to keep track of grain in a temple bureaucracy is what pushed marks-on-clay into a system that could one day carry epics.
A window into the world's first total state. The Ur III administration tracked every animal, every worker, every shekel — for a population in the millions. The level of paperwork was not exceeded until the modern era.